NETWORKS AND NOAH’S SONS:
A Response to Jeffrey Bingham and Susan Graham
Jouette M. Bassler
My assignment is to respond to Prof. Jeffrey Bingham’s and Prof. Susan Graham’s
respective analyses of Irenaeus’s interpretations of Romans 8 and 9-11 and in doing so to
contribute to the dialogue of scriptural criticism, itself a multi-layered discipline. With so many
layers of authors, texts, and disciplines the task is daunting, but I have been greatly informed by
the earlier work of this seminar1 and so I welcome the offer—and the challenge—of joining the
conversation. I come to this conversation as someone immersed most recently not in Romans
but in the Pastoral Letters. Yet that is not bad preparation for reading Irenaeus, who quotes 1
Tim 1:4 in the first sentence of his Adversus Haereses. The techniques of the two ancient writers
are different—the Pastor puts words in Paul’s mouth while Irenaeus (at least in A.H.) puts an
interpretive network around Paul’s words—but their mindsets are similar. And they share the
same goals: to reclaim the apostle for one side of a controversy when his words often give
apparent support to the other (as in A.H.) or to rethink the apostle’s ideas within a different
context (as in the Epideixis). The similarities between the Pastor and the Bishop triggered a
measure of hermeneutical wariness, for I have learned from the former that in a polemical
situation reconstructing the background of an argument requires taking the author’s explanation
with a grain of salt.
I also come to this conversation having taught a seminar on Romans recently, one that I
have come fondly to refer to as The Course From Hell. Last spring, for the first time in many
semesters, I found it difficult to get students engaged with the text, excited about it, urgent to
claim—or challenge—its relevance for their lives. The fault, I fear, was at least partly my own,
2
and so I come eager to learn, for my students’ sake, how to engage more effectively in scriptural
criticism. And finally I come to the writing of this response shortly after September 11 (and with
a daughter who works in lower Manhattan). The events of that day—visual and visceral in their
impact—and the ongoing repercussions of those events are now inescapable aspects of my
encounter with this or any other text. The significance of identifying these elements of my own
context should become clear in the response that follows. I begin with Prof. Bingham’s paper.
IRENAEUS’S READING OF ROMANS 8
I would summarize Prof. Bingham’s analysis of Irenaeus’s reading of Romans 8 in the
following way, using the three poles of scriptural criticism. A single pragmatic consideration
dominates Irenaeus’s reading of the text—the real and present threat of gnosticism. He reads
Romans 8, and all other scriptural texts, from a fixed and inviolate theological perspective—the
rule of faith. And his exegetical method is a sophisticated version of proof-texting2—he
constructs a “canonical network” within which problematic texts were properly (that is,
orthodox-ly) to be read. What follows is not presented as a critique of this analysis. In fact, it
seems to me to be sound, interesting, and informative. Rather, I offer some observations
generated by the particulars of my own circumstances.
BENEATH AND BEYOND THE POLEMIC: CONTEXTUAL CONSIDERATIONS.
Irenaeus
clearly states that his reason for composing A.H. was to expose and refute the teachings of
various gnostic groups, especially the Valentinians. Though written over the course of several
1
Especially as published in Reading Israel In Romans: Legitimacy and Plausibility of Divergent Interpretations (ed.
C. Grenholm and D. Patte; Harrisburg: Trinity Press International, 2000).
2
In using this term I do not mean to denigrate Irenaeus’s method or insights. As Bingham notes, for Irenaeus “the
immediate literary context [of a text] is a context for understanding the thought of the apostle,” and the Bishop is
sensitive to many aspects of Paul’s thought. Yet indisputably his primary concern is to prove the orthodox
interpretation of some problematic verses by linking together citations of biblical texts.
3
years, under occasionally difficult circumstances,3 the work adheres to a careful plan. After
describing the beliefs of various gnostic groups (Book I) and refuting the principal theses of the
Valentinians regarding the nature of God and creation (Book II), he then sets forth the unified
teaching of the church on these issues (Book III) and confirms this teaching with the words of
Christ found in the Gospels (Book IV). In the first part of Book V he sets out to correct gnostic
interpretation of Paul and to show that Paul’s message is in complete accord with the message of
truth. At the center of Irenaeus’s concern here is gnostic appropriation of 1 Cor 15:50 to support
their rejection of the material world and denial of a resurrection of the flesh. The verse seems to
offer them excellent support: “Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the
perishable inherit the imperishable.” But Irenaeus sets out to reclaim the verse, and the apostle,
for the orthodox doctrine of redemption of the flesh.4
In the context of this exegetical controversy Irenaeus develops a network of texts to
support his counter interpretation of 1 Cor 15:50. Bingham lends concreteness to the
controversy by providing ancient examples (and modern interpretations) of gnostic exegesis of
this verse; then he focuses on two portions of Irenaeus’s argument where Romans 8 figures
3
In addition to the obvious pressure of the gnostic threat that motivates the work, some historians believe that at
least Book II was written during a time of persecution (see Dominic J. Unger, St. Irenaeus of Lyons: Against the
Heresies [ACW 55; New York: Paulist, 1992] 4).
4
Echoes of this exegetical controversy can still be heard in contemporary scholarship. Some maintain that Paul’s
comment is not a rejection of the resurrection of the dead at all, but a reference to those who are alive—real “fleshand-blood” people as opposed to corpses (see, e.g., Joachim Jeremias, “’Flesh and Blood Cannot Inherit the
Kingdom of God (I Cor. xv.50),” NTS 2 [1955/56] 151-59; Gordon D. Fee, The First Epistle to the Corinthians
[Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1987] 799). Others insist that the words accurately reflect Paul’s conviction (shared by
many in his world) that a resurrection of a flesh-and-blood body is not possible; what is resurrected is “a ‘pneumatic
body’—that is, a body composed only of pneuma with sarx and psyche having been sloughed off along the way”
(Dale B. Martin, The Corinthian Body [New Haven: Yale University Press, 1995] 104-36, esp. p. 126). For a survey
of the shift from the biblical concept of resurrection of the dead (e.g., Mt 22:31; Lk 22:35; Rom 1:4; 1 Cor 15:12-57)
to the creedal affirmation of the resurrection of the flesh, see H. B. Swete, “The Resurrection of the Flesh,” JTS 18
(1917) 135-41.
4
strongly in his counter-exegesis, A.H. 5.7.1—8.2 and 5.10.2—11.1.5 Overall Bingham describes
Irenaeus’s response as an intellectual tour de force. He shows how Irenaeus went ideologically
and exegetically head to head with his opponents and countered their doctrines and
interpretations with arguments grounded in tradition, scripture, and reason.
What struck me was the absence of experience from this calculus. This is particularly
striking because the experience of the Bishop’s own flock—the intense persecution and
martyrdom of Christians in Lyons only a few short years before the composition of this work—
seems so very germane to the topic of resurrection of the flesh. The Letter of the Martyrs of
Gaul, written soon after the tragic events, even notes that the persecutors burned the bodies of the
martyrs and threw them into the Rhone River so “that they might not even have hope of
resurrection” (E.H. 5.1.60-61). Clearly the persecutors’ understanding of Christian belief was
that resurrection was not conceivable without the participation of the fleshly body. It has been
noted that the Letter of the Martyrs “does not show any theological concern about the loss of the
martyrs’ remains” and seems to assume that they obtained life at the very moment of their
death.6 Resurrection of the flesh—or not; instantaneous life after death—or later resurrection
with the body. These issues that surface in the Letter of the Martyrs are the very issues that
Irenaeus addresses in Book V! 7 Is it possible that Irenaeus’s view of the resurrection and his
reflections on the scriptural texts relevant to that doctrine were forged exclusively in anti-gnostic
dispute, with no pastoral roots in the experiences of the members of his own church?8
5
Bingham gives less attention to a third section (at the end of book V) where Irenaeus again invokes Romans 8; my
response, like his paper, focuses primarily on the earlier passages.
6
Denis Farkasfalvy, “Christological Content and Its Biblical Basis in the Letter of the Martyrs of Gaul,” Second
Century 9 (1992) 5-25, esp. p. 13.
7
Though not highlighted in Bingham’s paper, one aspect of Irenaeus’s polemic with the gnostics was whether souls
separated immediately from the body at death to ascend into heaven, or awaited “in the invisible place allotted to
them” later resurrection with their bodies (A.H. 5.31.2).
8
Compare, e.g., the assessment of H. B. Swete, who, like Bingham, links the church’s insistence on the resurrection
of the flesh to the second century anti-gnostic polemic (“Resurrection of the Flesh,” 137) with that of Caroline
5
Irenaeus does not often refer to the martyrs, but he does occasionally, and I found one of
these references in the section of A.H. framed by the two passages that Bingham treats:9
On the other hand, as many as fear God and trust in His Son’s advent, and who through
faith do establish the Spirit of God in their hearts,—such men as these shall be properly
called both “pure,” and “spiritual,” and “those living to God,” because they possess the
Spirit of the Father, who purifies man, and raises him up to the life of God. For as the
Lord has testified that “the flesh is weak,” so [does He also say] that “the spirit is
willing.” . . . . If, therefore, any one admix the ready inclination of the Spirit to be, as it
were, a stimulus to the infirmity of the flesh, it inevitably follows that what is strong will
prevail over the weak, so that the weakness of the flesh will be absorbed by the strength
of the Spirit; . . . . Thus it is, therefore, that the martyrs bear their witness, and
despise death, not after the infirmity of the flesh, but because of the readiness of the
Spirit. For when the infirmity of the flesh is absorbed, it exhibits the Spirit as powerful;
and again, when the Spirit absorbs the weakness [of the flesh], it possesses the flesh as an
inheritance in itself, and from both of these is formed a living man,—living indeed,
because he partakes of the Spirit, but man, because of the substance of flesh. The flesh,
therefore, when destitute of the Spirit of God, is dead, not having life, and cannot possess
the kingdom of God. . . . but where the Spirit of the Father is, there is a living man;
[there is ] the rational blood preserved by God for the avenging [of those that shed
it]; [there is] the flesh possessed by the Spirit, forgetful indeed of what belongs to it,
and adopting the quality of the Spirit, being made conformable to the Word of God.
(A.H. 5.9.2-3)
There are, to be sure, no direct quotations of Romans 8 in this passage, so it is
understandable that Bingham did not treat it; but it is filled with reflections on the overcoming of
the flesh by the Spirit, a concern that dominates that chapter of Paul’s letter. If Irenaeus thought
of the martyrs when writing these words in chapter 9, did he also have them in mind when he
wrote in chapter 7 that those who do not now see the face of God shall see it and shall rejoice
with unspeakable joy?10 And since he regards the martyrs as exemplars of the Spirit
overcoming the flesh, did he also have them in mind when he wrote on the same topic in chapter
Walker Bynum, who claims that in the treatises on the resurrection from the late second century (including
Irenaeus’s work) “the palpable, vulnerable, corruptible body Christ redeems and raises was quintessentially the
mutilated cadaver of the martyr” (The Resurrection of the Body in Western Christianity, 200-1336 [New York:
Columbia University Press, 1995] 43, see also pp. 38-39).
9
Bingham notes that Irenaeus alludes to the martyrs in a section devoted to the renewal of creation. My question is
whether their experience affected his earlier reflections on the resurrection of the flesh.
10
A.H. 5.7.2. The text cited is 1 Pet 1:8, but the expectation of future rejoicing is new, perhaps an echo of Rom
8:18, a verse that was important to the martyrs (see Farkasfalvy, “Martyrs of Gaul,” 10).
6
8, where Romans 8 is explicitly cited? Thus I wonder: How would it change the perception and
analysis of Irenaeus’s reading of Romans if it were framed, not simply in the words of the
gnostic exegetes as Bingham has done, but also in the words of and about the Christians of
Lyons who died for their faith in firm expectation of resurrection from the dead? It might
highlight a different set of verses in Romans and track a different line through Irenaeus’s
argument.
It might also raise another set of questions that are important to ask, even if they prove to
be ultimately unanswerable. Did the martyrs share Irenaeus’s concern about the resurrection of
the flesh? The Letter suggests that they did not. It was their sense of the abiding presence of the
Lord that sustained them in their trials, not church doctrine on the resurrection of the flesh.11
Had they perhaps come to disdain the flesh in ways that approached gnostic perceptions?12
Were there competing bases for authoritative revelation?13 The martyrs and those influenced by
them clearly located authoritative revelation in their experience. Irenaeus locates it in scripture
(interpreted by the rule of faith). Was a struggle within the orthodox church occurring in the
shadow of the gnostic controversy? The voices of the martyrs are important in this dialogue, for
they show how Irenaeus’s interpretation of Romans 8 touched (or could have touched) and
informed (or was informed by) real lives and deaths. To ignore this possibility deprives
Irenaeus’s text of religious relevance and restricts its significance to doctrinal debate.
11
Martin draws a similar conclusion: “my guess is that [ordinary Christians] seldom thought about the resurrection
systematically” (Resurrection Body, 124).
12
We do not have evidence from the Gallic martyrs, but a few years later in the city of Carthage, the young martyr
Perpetua recorded among her own visions that of Saturus, one of her fellow prisoners (or a later compiler included
Saturus’s vision with hers). His vision included the observation, “We had died and had put off the flesh,” and
Perpetua’s comment (she was present in the vision) was, “I am happier here now than I was in the flesh” (cited in
Joyce E. Salisbury, Perpetua’s Passion: The Death and Memory of a Young Roman Woman [New York: Routledge,
1997] 112-13).
13
See, e.g., Maureen A. Tilley, “Scripture as an Element of Social Control: Two Martyr Stories of Christian North
Africa,” HTR 83/4 (1990) 338-97; Fannie J. LeMoine, “Apocalyptic Experience and the Conversion of Women in
7
These suggestions and comments are, I realize, highly speculative, and I admit that they
have been informed by the catastrophic destruction of the WTC, by the obscene sight of burning
flesh and falling bodies, and by the indomitable spirits of the rescuers. Out of this came a need
to acknowledge the martyrs’ voices, to inject somehow their mutilated flesh and bodies and
indomitable spirits, their heteronomous experiences into Irenaeus’s coolly analytical
arguments.14
Contemporary exegetes face similar questions about the relevant context (or contexts) for
interpreting Romans. Is it Paul’s theological conflict—real or anticipated—with the Jerusalem
church that guides his choice of topics and arguments, or is it his awareness of (and sympathy
for) the experience of the weak in the church in Rome (whoever they are)? Has his anticipated
mission trip to Spain led him to recapitulate the theological core of his universal gospel, or did
his experiences in Corinth and Galatia leave a residue of polemical or pastoral urgency on his
words to Rome?15 The text of chapter 8 also invites attention to the spiritual experiences of the
readers (vv. 9-11, 14-16, 23, 26), but who were those readers? Were they Jewish Christians or
Gentile Christians, or both? And if both, did they experience the Spirit in the same way?
Exegetes struggle to identify the experiences that served as the context for the writing and the
reading of the letter. Some reconstructions highlight the ideological dimension of the letter;
others the pastoral or religious dimensions. Only sometimes do we seem aware that our own
Early Christianity,” Fearful Hope: Approaching the New Millennium (ed. C. Kleinhenz and F. J. LeMoine;
Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 1999) 201-6.
14
I am indebted here also to the reflections of Cristina Grenholm and Daniel Patte (“Receptions, Critical
Interpretations, and Scriptural Criticism” and “A Post-Holocaust Biblical Critic Responds,” pp. 1-54 and 225-45 in
Reading Israel).
15
For a survey of the various proposals, see A. J. M. Wedderburn, The Reasons for Romans (Edinburgh: T. & T.
Clark, 1988).
8
experiences incline us toward certain understandings of Paul’s.16 And then we work out our
interpretations in the agon of scholarship, where again ideas prevail, rarely concerned with the
experiences of the text that our students and readers have had. The tripolar paradigm presses us
to give more serious attention to experience, at all levels of our interpretation.
LOCATING THE AUDIENCE: SOME HERMENEUTICAL PRESUPPOSITIONS.
Though Prof.
Bingham defines the polemical context of A.H. in significant detail, he does not describe the
intended (authorial) audience of the work. I understand the difficulties involved. Nowhere does
Irenaeus identify the “dear friend” who asked him to write the work (5.praef.). He anticipates
that this friend will present and interpret the work to others (1.praef.3), and he envisions a
different group of “others” reading and pondering his work themselves (5.praef.). Who these
others were and where they might have lived is the source of some speculation, but no
certainty,17 and Bingham does not offer any concrete suggestions. So while the work has a
known author and a fixed point of origin, the authorial audience remains shadowy, both in the
text of A.H. and in Bingham’s analysis of it, enhancing the timeless quality that Irenaeus assumes
for Paul’s words. This enhanced timelessness comes home to roost in the conclusion of
Bingham’s paper when “we” are identified with the intended audience: “Irenaeus reads Romans
8 as telling us something about our own nature. It reveals to us at least in part what we are. It
speaks to us anthropologically, informing us about what it is to be human.” After these
comments the confessional “we” disappears again beneath Bingham’s historical analysis. But
what does its brief appearance imply? Let me offer an observation and invite Prof. Bingham’s
response.
16
This situation is, of course, changing with the growing influence of cultural studies on biblical interpretation; see,
e.g., Daniel Boyarin, A Radical Jew: Paul and the Politics of Identity (Berkeley: University of California Press,
1994), esp. pp. 1-6.
9
Bingham reads Irenaeus’s reading of Paul with obvious appreciation, setting himself at
the outset within a “trend in positive appraisals of Irenaeus’s use of Paul” (p. 1). Thus his
conclusion is framed very positively: “He [Irenaeus] draws Paul’s implicit principles forth and
makes them explicit” (p. 11). The web that Bingham has detected and defined does not distort; it
clarifies and focuses. Because Irenaeus is so attuned (in Bingham’s view) to the apostle’s
thought, the Bishop assumes, for a moment at least, Paul’s mantle of canonical authority. His
words transcend his historical context and situational polemic and speak directly to “us,” and by
implication to all humanity. Thus Bingham reinforces the authority of Irenaeus’s interpretation,
an authority which Irenaeus himself, with due rhetorical modesty, implicitly claims.18
Bingham’s appreciative reading has gone far in elucidating the power and purpose of Irenaeus’s
canonical network. A resistant reading could complement his work by identifying with equal
clarity its problems.
THE IRENAEUS IN EACH OF US: SOME OBSERVATIONS ABOUT METHOD.
Bingham
notes that, in the end, there is no substantive difference in method or technique between Irenaeus
and his gnostic opponents: “For Irenaeus and Tertullian, [1 Cor 15:50] could only be properly
read within a carefully constructed canonical network. . . . [T]he same was true of their
opponents.” We can go one step farther and note that the charges Irenaeus brings against his
opponents’ use of scripture are in many ways valid criticisms of his own work:

They gather their views from sources other than the scripture (1.8.1)—so does Irenaeus,
whose starting point of interpretation was the unwritten rule of faith.
17
Cf., e.g., Unger, St. Irenaeus, 4-6 (who favors Rome) and Robert M. Grant, Irenaeus of Lyons (Early Church
Fathers; London and New York: Routledge, 1997) 6 (who favors Asia and Phrygia).
18
See, e.g., A.H. 1.praef.2: “I have deemed it my duty . . . to unfold to thee, my friend, these portentous and
profound mysteries, which do not fall within the range of every intellect, because all have not sufficiently purged
their brains (or, have not sufficient brains). . . . Not that I am practised either in composition or eloquence; but my
feeling of affection prompts me to make known to thee and all thy companions those doctrines which have been kept
in concealment until now, but which are at last, through the goodness of God, brought to light.”
10

They disregard the order and connection of the scriptures and transfer passages and rearrange
them (1.8.1)—so does Irenaeus, who recontextualizes the texts as a canonical web.

They gather together sayings and names from scattered places and transfer them from a
natural meaning to an unnatural (1.9.4)—so does Irenaeus.

“Obviously,” says Grant in response to Irenaeus’s charges, “what appealed to Gnostic
converts was the theological synthesis of diverse scriptural passages, along with a secret
pattern [gnostic cosmology or anthropology] to hold them together”19 —the same is true of
Irenaeus. Except, of course, his pattern was not secret; it was the rule of faith.
By its very nature, the web of scriptural texts that Irenaeus created had the potential of
generating dialogue among the many perspectives represented by these varied texts and
enhanced by their various intertextual associations. But Irenaeus invokes the rule of faith to
level out the differences, to remove ambiguities, and thus to control the dialogue. The rule
determines which Pauline texts are given voice (Rom 8:3 is notably absent!) and then tunes the
selected texts to a single orthodox key. Though Irenaeus speaks repeatedly of the authority of
scripture (e.g., A.H. 2.28.2; 3.21.4),20 this is always subordinated to the higher authority of the
rule of faith, exercised through the teaching magisterium of the church.21
Thus for Irenaeus it is not a matter of good versus bad exegetical practices, but the
validity of the pattern that controls the exegesis, whether gnostic cosmology or the orthodox rule
of faith, whether (in Irenaeus’s polemical terms) myth or truth. At an even deeper level, I think,
what is also important is the issue of the one versus the many. Irenaeus develops this contrast in
many ways—the oneness of god (versus gnostic separation of the gods of the OT and NT or the
19
Grant, Irenaeus, 25.
See also Unger, St. Irenaeus, 8-11.
21
Irenaeus even warns against reading scripture alone. It should be done in the company of the presbyters of the
church, “among whom is the apostolic doctrine” (4.32.1).
20
11
plurality of the Aeons), the oneness of Christ (versus gnostic separation of Jesus and the Christ),
the unity of the body (versus gnostic separation of spirit and flesh). He also contrasts the unity
of the message produced by orthodox exegesis (no great surprise, since the exegesis is controlled
by the rule of faith!) and the diversity of interpretations (the “contradictions,” as he calls them;
5.praef.) offered by gnostic exegetes. Indeed, he says, by their diversity of interpretations they
convict themselves of falsehood (4.35.4; see also 5.20.1-2), for truth is singular by definition.
This then reveals the power and purpose of Irenaeus’s web—it eliminates the possibility of
different interpretations, for if that were permitted the orthodox position would be no more
secure than the gnostics’. Irenaeus sees clearly that a multiplicity of interpretations undermines
the very concept of orthodoxy, which rests on the claim of the singularity of truth.
It is exceedingly ironic, then, that this seminar, with its presupposition of the legitimacy
and plausibility of divergent interpretations,22 should focus attention on Irenaeus. To be sure, he
represents one interpretation of Romans, but it is an interpretation that would, on principle,
exclude all others, for to admit to an alternative reading would be to step on the slippery slope
that leads to contradictions and falsehood. What can biblical scholars committed to “the
legitimacy and plausibility of divergent interpretations” learn from such an intractable dialogue
partner as Irenaeus?
As it turns out, Irenaeus holds up a mirror to us that reveals our own practices of webcreation and web-maintenance and warns us against absolutist claims for our interpretations. A
few familiar examples must suffice to illustrate how commentators have created interpretive
webs to bring a level of coherence to Paul’s notoriously ambiguous anthropological terminology.
It is not a point that needs to be belabored.
22
In the words of the opening essay of the first volume to come from the work of this seminar, “claiming a single
criterion of truth is . . .scandalous” (Grenholm and Patte, “Receptions,” 7).
12
In his commentary on Romans, Ernst Käsemann worked essentially within the web of
existentialist assumptions developed by his teacher and mentor Rudolf Bultmann. To this he
added a greater emphasis on the eschatological and cosmological dimensions of Paul’s thought
and a concern over Christian enthusiasm, which, he said, not only disturbed Paul’s churches but
those of his day as well.23 He defines “flesh” in Bultmannian terms as the sphere of subjection to
the world, which, even in its piety, is unholy (188-91). Because of his anti-enthusiast concerns,
however, the concept of spirit seems to interest him more. Indeed, he reads chapter 8 as Paul’s
manifesto against enthusiasm (212f.), and that provides him with its interpretive key. Thus he
identifies Paul’s frequent references to the indwelling spirit as the language of enthusiasm, but
language transformed by the apostle into an ethical category meaning “standing under the
present Lord” (223). The groanings of the church (v. 23) he heard as a reference to the ecstatic
cries of the enthusiasts, redefined by Paul into a sign of weakness (240f.). “The apostle’s
intention is clear,” says Käsemann, “even if his mode of expression is difficult to understand”
(224). Such is the power of Käsemann’s interpretive web. Yet if Käsemann claims to penetrate
the apostle’s intent, he acknowledges the provisional nature of his insight and welcomes critical
testing and open discussion of his conclusions (viii).
J. D. G. Dunn reads the letter through a different but equally distinctive grid, that of the
new perspective on Paul that he has helped to articulate and popularize.24 According to this
perspective, Paul rejected justification by works of law not because it was a legalistic system of
earning merit, but because it expressed of a sense of national privilege restricting God’s grace to
ethnic Israel. This perspective provides Dunn with the hermeneutical key to crucial passages
like 2:12-29; 3:27-31; 7:14-25; 9:30-10:4; and 12:1-15:6. It does not dominate his interpretation
23
24
Ernst Käsemann, Commentary on Romans (trans. G. W. Bromiley; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1980) 212.
J. D. G. Dunn, Romans (Word Biblical Commentary 38; 2 vols.; Dallas: Word, 1988) 1.xvi.
13
of chapter 8 to quite the same degree, but the presence of this grid is evident when Dunn clarifies
the meaning of flesh. “Flesh,” he claims, is basically an apocalyptic category denoting “an
unavoidable attachment and tie to this age” (1.391). As such it has both individual and corporate
dimensions, encompassing both the weakness and corruptibility of the creature and also—and
most distinctively for Dunn—the central failing of Paul’s own people, who “regard the national
badge of circumcision ‘in the flesh’ as that which marks them off from Gentiles as God’s chosen
people” (1.363). This perspective colors his exegesis in subtle ways throughout the chapter. No
less than Käsemann, Dunn reads this chapter polemically; he just defines the opposing position
differently and thus locates the polemical thrust in different verses. It is mildly ironic that Dunn
introduces his new perspective by decrying the way “that Protestant exegesis has for too long
allowed a typically Lutheran emphasis on justification by faith to impose a hermeneutical grid on
the text of Romans” (1.lxv). His new perspective replaces that grid with another, “which binds
the whole letter into a cohesive whole” (1.lxxii), but this one, Dunn maintains, derives from the
apostle’s own context.25
Stanley Stowers also wants to establish an interpretive grid from Paul’s own context, but
for him the ruling schema is gentile struggle for self-mastery over passions. In light of this
schema Stowers interprets “flesh” exclusively as a moral category (and emphatically not as a
theological or apocalyptic one)—the place where passions and desires reside. Romans 8 then
relates the reversal of the divine curse on gentiles (Stowers refuses to universalize the message to
refer to humankind) that made the flesh weak and particularly vulnerable to sin.26 Empowered
by the spirit, gentiles can resist the flesh and gain the self-mastery and divine approval that they
25
But see now the critique of this claim by John M. G. Barclay in “’Neither Jew Nor Greek’: Multiculturalism and
the New Perspective on Paul,” Ethnicity and the Bible (ed. Mark G. Brett; Biblical Interpretation Series 19; Leiden:
Brill, 1996) 197-214.
14
seek. Few interpreters are as sensitive as Stowers to the power of an interpretive grid to control
the reading of a text (1-16). He respects the inevitability, and the validity, of multiple readings
(esp. pp. 4, 16), yet he urges the advantages of his own unipolar reading. It provides, he says, as
others do not, a coherent understanding of Paul’s discourse.
Daniel Boyarin reads Romans 8 from the perspective of yet another master narrative—
Gal 3:28-29, which he takes to announce the erasure of human difference and hierarchy.27 This
perspective determines the meaning of “flesh,” which Boyarin views as the site of difference,
whether it is understood as the penis, which defines sexual difference, or physical kinship, which
creates ethnic difference. He reads Romans 7—8 as the description of bondage to and release
from sexuality, with 8:13 providing the climax:
So then, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh (that is, not to the obligation to
procreate), to live according to the flesh—for if you live according to the flesh you will
die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body (sex and procreation) you
will live—bearing spiritual fruit for God.
Boyarin makes no absolutist claims for his interpretation. It derives, he recognizes, from his
choice of Gal 3:28 as his starting point; other starting points and other interpretations have equal
validity (5).
All these different and plausible valuations of Paul’s anthropological language in Romans
8 derive from the application of different master narratives or interpretive grids to the text.
Where Irenaeus used the rule of faith, others use different construals of the story behind the letter
26
Stanley K. Stowers, A Rereading of Romans: Justice, Jews, and Gentiles (New Haven: Yale University Press,
1994) 279-84.
27
Boyarin, Radical Jew, 22. Others interpret the implications of Gal 3:28 differently; see, e.g., Lone Fatum,
“Image of God and Glory of Man: Women in the Pauline Congregations,” in Image of God and Gender Models in
Judaeo-Christian Tradition (ed. K. E. Børresen; Oslo: Solum, 1991) 56-137, esp pp. 62-70; Martin, Corinthian
Body, 230-32.
15
or of the central concepts of Paul’s theology to shape and level Paul’s thought and thus to
achieve coherence and consistency in his message. To assert this, however, is to assert the
obvious. Some construal is necessary to interpret the text of this complex, convoluted letter. Yet
the path of Pauline interpretation is littered with the textual debris of this drive toward
theological consistency. Thus the mirror Irenaeus holds up reveals an Irenaeus in each of us.
We grant interpretive authority to a master narrative or grid; on the basis of this we prioritize
certain verses in our interpretation; we strive toward an ideal of consistency. The crucial point is
the degree of openness to alternative readings. Irenaeus rejects them, but the text itself pushes us
toward openness. There is a resilient level of indeterminacy to Paul’s language, especially his
anthropological language.28 It resists definitive packaging. And so with each interpretation there
are verses that refuse to fit smoothly, arguments that refuse to convince utterly. The context of
our interpretation shifts and the door opens to yet another reading of this text, another master
narrative, another attempt to engage in dialogue with this most protean of theologians.
IRENAEUS AS READER OF ROMANS 9-11
Professor Graham shows us in the Epideixis another side of Irenaeus’s reception of
Paul—quite different from the explicit appropriation of the apostle’s words in A.H. to create an
interpretive network around a problematic verse. She maintains that Irenaeus had Romans 9-11
“in mind” when he wrote this survey of salvation history. More specifically: Though Irenaeus
did not use the imagery of Romans and though he did not cite Paul’s words, nevertheless, she
maintains, when he wrote about the events of Genesis 6-10 he incorporated a great deal of the
apostle’s theology of election and salvation history into his depiction of Noah and his three sons.
28
See, e.g., Robert Jewett, Paul’s Anthropological Terms: A Study of Their Use in Conflict Settings (AGAJU 10;
Leiden: Brill, 1971) 1; also Dunn, Romans, 1.445.
16
To prove such a subtle thesis requires a subtle methodology, and Professor Graham has given us
one. She notes shared theological features, similar patterns of Old Testament quotations, and
what appear to be reminiscences of (or allusions to) specific portions of Romans 9-11. There is
no smoking gun, but the circumstantial evidence that she presents is impressive, and my initial
skepticism gave way to admiring assent.
That said, the thesis poses an interesting challenge to the practitioner (or evaluator) of
scriptural criticism. In this tractate Irenaeus does not explicitly cite, analyze, or even
acknowledge the text of Romans, nor does he reflect on his operative hermeneutical
assumptions. And if it is clear that Irenaeus had Romans 9-11 “in mind,” it is equally clear that
he had other texts “in mind” as well. Thus, for example, a passage that Graham describes as a
combination of reminiscences of Romans 9:12-18 and 9:4 with a precis of Romans 10:14-18
(Epid. 41, cited on p. 14) is laced with allusions to Acts, John, and 1 Corinthians as well. And a
text that she presents as a paraphrase of Romans 9:22 (Epid. 8, cited on p. 18) could, I think, be
described with equal justification as a paraphrase of Acts 17.29 It is not just Romans 9-11 that is
consciously or unconsciously influencing the Bishop’s thought but a broad amalgam of texts,
which tempers the impact of the individual components. It would be informative, I think, to
complement Graham’s analysis of the similarities between Romans 9-11 and the Epideixis with a
brief consideration of distinctive features of Romans 9-11 that have been suppressed in the
interplay of the various texts in Irenaeus’s mind. Then we can reconsider the question, addressed
in Graham’s concluding observations, about the likely reasons for this particular reception of
Romans 9-11. And finally, a few words about some hermeneutical implications of this reception
29
Correspondences with Acts 17 include the depiction of God as Maker of heaven and earth (v. 24), the One who
bestows life and breath (v. 25), who upholds and sustains all things (v. 28), and who will render final judgment after
a period of kindness (vv. 30-31).
17
of Romans. First, though, which of the distinctive features of Romans 9-11 are lost in
Irenaeus’s reading of Genesis 6-10?
LIKE YET UNLIKE: INTERPRETATION BY OMISSION:
Graham mentions a number of
shared theological features (pp. 5-11), identifying as most significant the gratuitous (merciful)
election of Israel and the constancy of God (p. 21). Mercy defines God’s actions in both Romans
9-11 and the Epideixis, but absent from Irenaeus’s discussion is the radical edge of Paul’s
understanding of election. Instead of the willful, almost capricious, deity depicted in Rom 9:15
(“I will have mercy on whom I have mercy”), instead of the apostle’s emphatic insistence that
God “has mercy on whomever he chooses and hardens the heart of whomever he chooses”
(9:18), the picture that emerges in Irenaeus’s tractate is of a god whose merciful actions are an
appropriate response to diligent human endeavor. This is particularly clear in the way that key
figures in the narrative are depicted.
Irenaeus remains true to the text of Genesis when he asserts that Noah was chosen
because of his righteousness (justice). His description of Shem and Japheth’s behavior, however,
expands the terse text of Genesis to include the explanation that theirs was an act of filial
“dutifulness” or “piety,” thereby justifying the blessings they received. The offensiveness of
Ham’s behavior—not altogether clear from the Hebrew text, which states simply that he “told”
his brothers of his father’s nakedness outside the tent where Noah lay—is given even more
thorough elaboration. It is represented as an act of mockery and impiety, justly evoking the
curse he received.30 Even more dramatic are the alterations to the story of Abraham. There is in
Irenaeus’s retelling no unprovoked divine call to an unremarkable Chaldean. Instead Irenaeus
gives us an Abraham who was actively “seeking the God who was his rightful due by the
30
The targums move in this direction by translating the Hebrew word “outside” (≈Wj) as “in the streets” or “in the
marketplace”—that is, in a public place where everyone could hear him.
18
blessing of his progenitor,” “going about all the earth” in his quest for God and growing faint
with the effort. God’s call comes in response to this diligence, evidence of divine “pity,”31 says
Irenaeus, not gratuitous election.32 Like Paul, Irenaeus regards God’s actions as rooted in a form
of mercy, but the Bishop does not push the concept in the direction of Paul’s thought in Romans
9-11. It is, as Graham notes, “a vision of a benevolent God . . . who rewards those who are
faithful” (p. 17). Irenaeus eliminates the arbitrary side of mercy suggested by Romans 9,33 but—
see below—he also eliminates the radically inclusive side of mercy that is proclaimed in Romans
11 (“God has imprisoned all in disobedience so that he may be merciful to all”).
Similarly Paul’s concern for divine faithfulness—given poignant expression in Paul’s
explicit (11:1) and implicit (9:6) questions, “Has God rejected his people?” and “Has the Word
of God failed?”—is significantly diluted when it emerges in the guise of Irenaeus’s concern for
the coherence of all salvation history (p. 9) . Gone entirely is the concept of the remnant (used
by Paul to document God’s fidelity to Israel). Gone also is the mystery surrounding the salvation
of “all Israel,” replaced by Irenaeus’s certitude concerning the necessity of faith in Christ (Epid.
51) and, in A.H., by the chilling view that Israel has already borne its fruit in producing the
Christ and is of no further value (or interest) in salvation history.
Of course, much of this can be explained by changed circumstances. As Graham notes,
“Irenaeus is not pastorally concerned with the relationship between Jews and Gentiles” (p. 19).
There were no Jews in Lyons, no Jewish Christians in the Bishop’s churches. But does that
31
So translated by Joseph P. Smith (St. Irenaeus: Proof of the Apostolic Preaching [ACW 16; London: Longmans,
Green and Co., 1952] 62); John Behn, cited by Graham, uses the word “mercy” in his translation. I do not know the
Armenian original.
32
Irenaeus deletes Ishmael and Esau from the record, obviating any need to justify the choice of Isaac and Jacob.
33
Dunn calls Paul’s conclusion in 9:18 “severe” but he celebrates the fact that the words “on whomever he chooses”
show that the apostle looks beyond the narrow election-conscious framework of the elect (Romans, 2.563). Gordon
Kaufman, on the other hand, sees “serious problems” with the verse, for in depicting God as an authoritarian tyrant
it encourages and enables domineering patterns of human behavior (In Face of Mystery: A Constructive Theology
[Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1993] 270).
19
account for all the shifts of emphasis? Why would Irenaeus be concerned to dilute so drastically
the concept of election? Why would he focus on God’s reward for faithful behavior rather than
on God’s unmerited grace? Why this particular modulation of Romans 9-11?
Graham observes at the beginning of her paper that the Epideixis is less burdened with
polemical interests than Irenaeus’s principal work, Adversus Haereses. Yet “less burdened” does
not mean unburdened, and there are enough explicit references to heretics to suggest that
Irenaeus had them at least occasionally in mind when he composed this later work.34 If this is so,
it offers a ready explanation for some of the shifts of emphasis we have seen, for they occur at
points where Paul’s distinctive emphasis was overly congenial to gnostic appropriation.
Paul’s radical doctrine of election was a particular favorite of the gnostics, since it
expressed a primary feature of their beliefs; and Romans 9:10-18 was a locus classicus of the
church’s exegetical controversy with them. The concept of the remnant readily lent itself to the
gnostic distinctions among various classes of persons, and the apostle’s emphasis on grace apart
from works nicely supported their deterministic claims about salvation.35 Read against the ever
present backdrop of the gnostic controversy, however muted it might be in the Epideixis,
Irenaeus’s subtle and not-so-subtle modulations of the message of Romans 9-11 make good
sense. The Bishop has eliminated not only those aspects of Paul’s message “that are not
germane to his pastoral concerns”—those concerning the relationship of Jews and Gentiles (p.
21)—but also, it seems, those aspects that are counter-productive with regard to his polemical
concerns. With Romans 9-11 only in mind and not here in debate, there was no reason for
Irenaeus to reproduce the more problematic aspects of Paul’s argument. He did not need to
wrestle with difficult verses or formulate any exegetical principles more complicated than simply
34
In fact, references to these opponents frame the body of the tractate; see Epid. 1, 2, 99, 100.
20
keeping in mind the more agreeable portions of Paul’s argument. This made it easier for
Irenaeus’s intended audience to follow the path of truth, but how are we to respond to his reading
of Romans?
A RESIDUE OF AMBIGUITY: HERMENEUTICAL REFLECTIONS:
Irenaeus is driven by the
conviction that the truth is unambiguous and singular, “a single upward path, lit by heavenly
light” (Epid. 1). Under the influence of Romans 9-11 he refocuses the story of the patriarchal
blessing to make it relevant to his gentile audience, immune to gnostic misreadings, and
unambiguous in its unfolding. Instead of tracking the blessing through the Isaac-Ishmael or the
Jacob-Esau splits, which demonstrate that “not all of Abraham’s children are his true
descendants” but require torturous exegesis to be made relevant to gentile concerns, Irenaeus
highlights the earlier blessing to Noah’s sons and sees in its unfolding the sequence and goal of
salvation history—destruction of the ungodly (Ham), temporary flourishing of Israel (Shem), and
final fulfillment in the mission to the Gentiles (Japheth). Irenaeus turns the ambiguities of the
Genesis text against Shem and his descendants: they do not receive a direct blessing36 (Why
not?) and their “tents” (that is, their heritage) are ultimately inhabited by (Or shared with?)
others. Irenaeus sees this worked out when Israel is made the “tail” to the gentiles’ “head”
(Epid. 95). With his Noachic typology Irenaeus is able to maintain Israel as an entity distinct
from the gentiles, thus avoiding Paul’s cooptation of the title “Israel” for all people of faith.
Israel’s salvation, however, is made entirely and explicitly dependent on their coming to faith in
Christ (Epid. 56). Thus the ambiguities of Romans 9-11 have been resolved as well—and again
35
See Elaine Hiesey Pagels, The Gnostic Paul: Gnostic Exegesis of the Pauline Letters (Philadelphia: Fortress,
1975) 37-42.
36
The text of the Hebrew Bible and of the Septuagint does not have the expected blessing of Shem (“Blessed by the
Lord God be Shem”) but a surprising blessing of God (“Blessed be the Lord the God of Shem”). This is usually
understood positively within the framework of Genesis as a foreshadowing of God’s election blessing to the
Patriarchs.
21
not in Israel’s favor. However, though Irenaeus’s intent is clear—to produce an unambiguous
story and a singular path to salvation—he does not succeed in eliminating all the tensions that
can allow creative space to develop alternative theological potentialities.37 I mention only two
examples.
The description of the unbelieving people who are to become the tail when the
descendants of Japheth become the head is, as Graham notes (p. 15), ambiguous (Epid. 95).
They are described in terms reminiscent of both Ham and Shem. But those to whom the
inheritance is now given—the offspring of Japheth—are also described in terms reminiscent of
Ham. Ham’s descendents, says Irenaeus, are the “ungodly” (Epid. 20), and he defines the
ungodly at the opening of the tractate as “the peoples that know not God . . . who do not worship
Him who IS” (Epid. 2). But this is also how he defines those who are to become the head: “God
was pleased to grant His inheritance to . . . those who were not God’s citizens, and know not
who God is” (Epid. 95). The categories are not simply porous; they are muddled and
overlapping and the tail, it seems, has become the head again.38
Irenaeus seems, however, entirely unambiguous about the means of Israel’s salvation:
before Christ “whoever feared God and died in justice and had the Spirit of God within them”
had hope of attaining salvation in the judgment of the risen Christ. For those who come after the
manifestation of Christ and “have not believed in Him, there is in the judgement inexorable
37
See Grenholm, “A Theologian and Feminist Responds,” in Reading Israel, 105-23, esp. p. 115.
Scholars note the same destabilizing potential in Paul’s description of God as the one ”who justifies the ungodly”
(Rom 4:5). As Andrew Lincoln observes, “the formulation of 4:5 also by implication places Abraham among the
ungodly (cf. 1:18), who deserve only God’s wrath and therefore have to receive justification as a gift . . . [This]
opens up for Jewish Christians a perception of Abraham, their forefather according to the flesh, and, by extension,
themselves as being in exactly the same position as Gentile Christians in regard to receiving justification” (“From
Wrath to Justification,” in Pauline Theology, Vol. III: Romans [ed. D. M. Hay and E. E. Johnson; Minneapolis:
Fortress, 1995] 151). Or, in the words of Brendan Byrne, “in painting Abraham in these colors Paul is taking the
provocative step of making the ‘Gentile’ stance before God somehow the norm” (Reckoning with Romans
[Wilmington: Glazier, 1986] 97). The same observations apply, mutatis mutandis, to the impact of Irenaeus’s
comments about Japheth on the position of the offspring of Ham.
38
22
vengeance” (Epid. 56). One must believe in the Son or face inexorable vengeance, but does that
comport with the nature of the Father whose Son he is?39 Early in the Epideixis Irenaeus gives
what appears to be a definitive statement of the nature of God (Epid. 8) that undermines the
harsh eschatological vengeance that he later depicts. What is stressed in the earlier passage is
God’s universal rule and overwhelming compassion:
And the Father is called by the Spirit Most High, and Almighty, and Lord of Hosts, that
we may learn that God is indeed such, that is, creator of heaven and earth and the whole
world, and maker of angels and men, and Lord of all, who upholds all things, and by
whom everything is sustained; merciful, compassionate and most tender, good, just,
God of all, both of Jews and of Gentiles and of the faithful.
To be sure, the various groups experience God differently:
But to the faithful He is as a Father, for in the end of times He has opened the testament
of adoption of sons. But to the Jews He was as Lord and Lawgiver, for when in the mean
time mankind had forgotten and fallen away and rebelled against God, He brought them
into subjection through the Law, that they might learn that they had a Lord who was
author and maker, who grants the breath of life, and to Him we must return homage by
day and by night. But to the Gentiles He is as Maker and Creator and Almighty. But for
all alike he is sustainer and nourisher and king and judge.
Even for the Jews and Gentiles the experience of God has a positive goal. And for all alike God
is sustainer and nourisher as well as, and before, God is king and judge. To be sure, Irenaeus
concludes by saying that “none shall escape immune from His judgment, neither Jew nor Gentile
nor sinner among the faithful, nor angel”; but he defines that judgment in the words of “the
blessed apostle” as rendering to each according to their works, not according to their Christian
faith. Every subsequent claim that Irenaeus makes needs to be tested against this depiction of the
unchanging, merciful, compassionate, most tender—and just—God. If the categories of persons
are not simply porous but overlapping and transparent to each other, the fixity of Irenaeus’s
scheme of salvation history becomes dislodged. And if the God of All is first and foremost the
39
See Grenholm’s perceptive comments on “construing a father” in “A Feminist Responds,” esp. pp. 118-20.
23
compassionate sustainer and nourisher of all, Irenaeus’s certainty about the fate of those who
have not believed becomes suspect.
EPILOGUE
At the opening of this essay I referred to changing contexts that evoke new
interpretations. Those words formed the platitudinous ending of a draft of this response written
before September 11. Now they have real import. We must acknowledge that the context of our
lives and therefore of our interpretations has changed far more dramatically and far more
suddenly than anyone could have anticipated. The first round of essays to emerge from the work
of this seminar focused—appropriately—on reading Romans 9-11 in a post-Holocaust context.
The terrorist attacks on September 11 do not diminish the importance of that task, but they add
another task, or another dimension to that task.
Daniel Patte has noted that meditating “before the Holocaust,” that is, meditating on the
practice of biblical criticism in the shadow of the Holocaust, reveals our status as outsiders. In
so doing it transforms our awareness of others—whether they be the Other of Israel, for whose
suffering in the Holocaust our discipline shares accountability; or the Other of the Readerbeliever, whose views and religious experiences we have dismissed as childish and naïve; or
even the Other of the Other Scholar, whose interpretations we seek to discount and supplant.
These are all, in one way or another, proximate Others, Others with whom we share a canon, a
faith, or an academic context. Now I think we are called to consider a more distant Other, a
different level of Otherness. I am not alluding here to the perpetrators of the attacks on
September 11, but to the Muslim world and Islamic faith, whose sense of alienation from our
world and faith and whose perception of our attitude toward them to be one of disregard and
disrespect seem to have created the climate in which these extremist acts were possible. These
24
are Others who are essentially nameless and faceless in Romans 8, at worst a part of “them”—
those who do not have the spirit of Christ and who therefore do not belong to God (Rom 8:9); at
best a part of “creation,” which eagerly awaits the revealing of the children of God (8:19)—as
outsiders. Irenaeus exacerbates the problem when he creates a web of texts that allows him to
gloss Paul’s claim that creation will share in the glorious liberty of the children of God (8:21)
with the contradictory assertion that it will do so in subjection to these children (A.H. 5.33.3-4).
The Bishop takes creation to refer exclusively to the material world, but even if he recognized
the possibility that it included the non-Christian human world as well,40 I do not think he would
have altered his conclusion.
In Romans 9-11 Paul wraps Israel’s place in salvation-history in a mystery that permits
interpretive choices.41 This mystery spills over onto the non-Christian, non-Jewish world with
the climactic affirmation, “God has imprisoned all in disobedience that he may have mercy on
all. O the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his
judgments and how inscrutable his ways” (Rom 11:31-32). Irenaeus’s typology eliminates the
mystery in favor of judgment. Ham’s offspring, which include “the Arabs . . . all the Egyptians
and the Lydians” (Epid. 20; the last group may refer to Libyans42), stand under a curse unless
they turn in faith to Christ. This does not foster respectful interfaith dialogue! Rather it
contributes to the ignorance and fear that leads to the hatred and violence that has been revealed
to us on September 11 and in the days and weeks following. Patte has said—correctly!—that we
cannot proceed with biblical interpretation solely from a stance of scientific detachment,43 not in
a post-Holocaust world and not in a post-September 11 world. We need to facilitate the creation
40
The intended referent of ktivsiı is highly debated; cf. Dunn, Romans, 1.469f.; Käsemann, Romans, 232f.
Patte, “Post-Holocaust Biblical Critic,” 231f., 241f.
42
See Smith, St. Irenaeus, 60, also 158 n. 106.
43
Patte, “Post-Holocaust Biblical Critic,” 232-35.
41
25
of bridges of understanding to this more distant Other. Irenaeus does not show us the way here,
except by a via negativa. But even his carefully constructed version of salvation history shows a
crackle of ambiguity that allows space to explore alternative theological possibilities.